By Maria Surma Manka •
September 21, 2007
Here’s an example of a global warming consequence that wasn’t exactly on my radar, and some strange news from our neighbors to the north.
The Canadian navy has traditionally had a good relationship with the garbage on board its ships: the cold Arctic temperatures have kept the mess frozen, allowing refuse and olfactory senses to live harmoniously.
Then came global warming. The increased temperatures have caused quite the stink on Canadian naval ships, so much so
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By Kelli Best-Oliver •
September 18, 2007
When Amy wrote about green magazines, she mentioned GOOD
as being one of her favorites. I, too, a self-described magazine junkie, am a big fan of GOOD since it’s inception last year. With all the depressing news out there on any given day, GOOD always reaffirms my faith in humanity. Its focus is, like its name implies, good stuff: those things that are
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By Clayton B. Cornell •
September 13, 2007
Last week, 46,000 revelers finally broke camp and split the scene of this year’s Burning Man festival, The Green Man. You could call it the "biggest party in the world," though it defies categorization and convention: part art, music, rave, pyrotechnics show, and costume orgy, it’s probably the only place in America you’d see a 1,000-foot-tall mushroom cloud intended for politically-minded artistic expression.
Yep, that’s right - a 1,000 ft. mushroom cloud, and no,
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By Elizabeth Redmond •
September 13, 2007
Designer Scott Amron has created a catalogue of conceptual products designed to persuade people to use less energy, or at least think about how many things are plugged into sockets in their homes. The experiment is called "Die Electric," named after the insulating properties of a dielectric material. A dielectric is a substance that is highly resistant to the flow of an electric current. The experiment is about
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How guilty to do you feel when you forget to recycle your rubbish from lunch, or accidentally put the wrong material out for the recycling company? If you suffer from Eco-Guilt Syndrome, there just may be a cure. Dom Anthony Sutch, a Benedictine Monk from Suffolk, is offering people the chance to confess their eco-sins.
At the Waveney Greenpeace festival this weekend, Brother Sutch will be on hand to hear
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By Heidi Strebel •
August 29, 2007
Several hundred volunteers recently posed naked on a glacier in Switzerland, to raise awareness about climate change. New York artist Spencer Tunick, who has staged photo shoots of nude gatherings in cities around the world, teamed up with the environmental activist group Greenpeace to immortalize a "living sculpture" of the six hundred people atop the retreating Aletsch glacier.
The Great Aletsch is the largest and longest glacier in Europe, and forms part of
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By Maria Surma Manka •
August 22, 2007
Two proposed coal-fired power plants in Iowa could negate the state’s efforts to cut emissions with clean, renewable power.
LS Power Group wants to build a 750-megawatt (MW) plant near Waterloo, and Alliant Energy wants a 630 MW coal plant near Marshalltown. A new MidAmerican Energy coal plant just began operation near Council Bluffs on June 1.
Local and regional supporters of clean and efficient energy will fight the plants.
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By Chris Baskind •
August 8, 2007
Editor’s note: This week, Lighter Footstep’s Chris Baskind takes a look at an unusual development in alternative energy: burning expired drugs. This post was originally published on August 6, 2007.
Imagine this sticker above your light switch: Powered by Prozac.
No, it’s not likely that your local power plant will be swapping coal for old Celebrex tablets anytime soon. But a little free energy is the happy byproduct of drug disposal by Milwaukee-based
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Photo Credit: Kansas City StarA bookstore in Kansas City has a huge glut of books in its warehouse. There are books that have gone unsold for more than a decade. Copies of books that had huge print runs, but now no one wants. Books that are decades old. Books that are in foreign languages. And, unfortunately for the store's owner, books that are not selling.
The owner has
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During our energy unit, I had a student tell me that her family was going to install compact fluorescent bulbs in their home, but they were worried about the mercury. Huh? I hadn't heard anything about this, and I had been using CFLs for years. I decided to investigate further.
Imagine my surprise when I learned that mercury exposure is a common misconception when it comes to CFLs. Fortunately, these
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Ready, set, SVO! Welcome to the 2007 Greaseball Challenge, a 4500 mile charity biofuel race from Washington D.C. to San Jose, Costa Rica. I nearly fell of my chair when I saw this - not that using biodiesel or converting a vehicle to run on straight vegetable oil (SVO) and driving to Central America is an entirely new concept. But to race for the benefit of charities and grassroots environmental groups?
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